Blaze damages West King Street business building

Firefighters extinguished a blaze Saturday night at the West King Street building that for many years housed Carlton's Interiors. Photo by ALAN ALSOBROOK, Special to The Record

A Saturday night fire on West King Street in St. Augustine ripped through the lower floor of a two-story building that was once home to a landmark business before city firefighters extinguished the blaze.

The fire at about 10 p.m. Saturday ignited on the first floor in space leased to a restaurant, according to St. Augustine Fire Marshall John Rayno.

Rayno said two people were evacuated safely from the 226 West King St. building.

One of the evacuated individuals was treated for smoke inhalation.

No one was transported to the hospital, Rayno said.

The Red Cross assisted at the scene.

“The fire was basically in the rear of the first floor,” Rayno said. “It was an accident, not intentional.”

He said the fire did not destroy the building, which was built in 1910 and for decades housed Carlton’s Interiors, owned by St. Augustine native Carlton O’Neal, who died in 2008 at age 81.

O’Neal sold fabrics downstairs and lived upstairs.

“There will be a lot more cleanup than re-construction needed,” Rayno said.

Any investigation into the fire would likely begin with a space heater found plugged in after the blaze was extinguished, he said.

But he said a cause might be determined without a lot of forensics.

“It would take a lot of lab work to determine whether that heater is the definitive cause because it basically melted into a small glob of plastic, but it is right in the middle of where the fire started,” Rayno said.

Investigators do not yet know whether the heater was left operating.

The building is zoned as a multi-use commercial residence, the first floor being commercial and the upper floor having 900 square feet of living space, according to the online real estate website Zillow.